Dryer appliances generally include a cabinet with a drum mounted therein. In some dryer appliances, a motor rotates the drum during operation of the dryer appliance, e.g., to tumble articles located within a chamber defined by the drum. Dryer appliances also generally include a heater assembly that passes heated air through the chamber of the drum in order to dry moisture-laden articles disposed within the chamber. This internal air then passes from the chamber through a vent duct to an exhaust conduit, through which the air is exhausted from the dryer appliance.
In some instances, it may be desirable to provide certain objects or fluids for the treatment of articles within a dryer appliance. For instance, dryer sheets are commonly placed within the drum of a dryer appliance to affect the smell of the fabrics or clothes being treated (i.e., tumbled and/or dried) in a specific laundry load. In other instances, a wrinkle release fluid (e.g., fluids comprising fabric relaxer, fabric softener, isopropyl alcohol, vinegar, etc.) may be applied to sprayed on articles by a user before or after the articles are treated by the dryer appliance. In still other instances a UV fabric protector (e.g., fluids comprising titanium oxide, bemotrizinol, etc.) to absorb or repel ultraviolet light emissions may be sprayed on articles by a user before or after the articles are treated by the dryer appliance. However, difficulties exist with such approaches. Specifically, a user must generally remember to supply a specific object or fluid to each individual drying load. Moreover, in many cases a user must estimate or guess how much of the specific object or fluid is appropriate for an individual load. Although some existing dryer appliances provide for automatically (e.g., without direct user input) supplying steam to individual dryer loads, existing dryer appliances are generally unable to automatically supply specific dryer additives to articles therein.
Accordingly, a dryer appliance having an additive dispensing assembly for delivering certain additives affecting the smell and/or performance of fabrics would be desirable. More particularly, an additive dispensing assembly that provides a suitable additive volume load across a range of applications would be especially desirable.